West Virginia Creates Jobs Farming Lavender at Former Coal Mines

ASHFORD, W.Va.—Charles Bowman’s hands used to be stained black with coal after work. Now, they smell like lavender. He is one of about 85 employees at Appalachian Botanical, a company that cultivates lavender on a former surface mine. Instead of coal, the company produces essential oils and other scented products and is part of a growing effort in West Virginia to reimagine an economy that is not dependent on coal. Mr. Bowman, 54 years old, said he once made $37.50 an hour as an electrician in an underground mine. Those jobs are mostly gone. Now he makes $11.50 an hour. Despite the pay cut, working on a farm that has doubled its acreage in the past year makes him hopeful.

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Amid coal’s steady decline, efforts are growing to repurpose former mines and lead the way to diversifying the state’s economy, creating jobs and cleaning up the environment, while helping to revive coalfield communities. Other former surface mines in southern West Virginia are being used by a solar-installation company, a company that uses aquaponics technology to produce lettuce and tilapia, and a third that is building cabins for tourists who visit ATV trails. The infrastructure bill in Congress currently would authorize $11.3 billion to pay for the reclamation of abandoned mine lands, with a significant portion of that heading to West Virginia.

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An estimated 550 square miles of West Virginia have been strip-mined, and less than 2% of that land has been redeveloped, according to Downstream Strategies. The sites offer flat land and typically have roads and access to water but can also be remote. Diversifying an economy once powered by coal—by turning mountains flattened by mining into an economic driver—is a tall order in a region that has been losing population and is still plagued by the opioid epidemic.

Boone County, where Appalachian Botanical is located, has lost nearly 15% of its population during the past decade. In 2019, mines in the county employed 775 workers, down from 4,092 workers in 2010, according to the latest available state records. Since 2010, the county’s tax revenue from coal has fallen 94%. County officials are now focused on keeping the courthouse running, said Brett Kuhn, a county commissioner who teaches history at a local high school. The county employs 74 people, half as many as five years ago.

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Jeff Wilson, president and CEO of the White Forest Resources, coal company, said he expects the lavender farm to keep expanding at the site based on its yields. Access to rail and electrical infrastructure could make other projects, including manufacturing, attractive on former mines in the state, he said: “I think it could be a model.”

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